Portable cooking or barbecue grills have conventionally been fueled with charcoal briquettes. Such briquettes are typically sold in different sized bags and users have placed such briquettes onto a charcoal grate or other charcoal supporting surface. This approach has presented some problems. Firstly, it has necessitated the user also to bring to the barbecue site a frequently heavy bag of charcoal briquettes. Aside from the inconvenience and possible spillage of charcoal briquettes or dust, the use of loose charcoals does not always result in controlled dispensing of a proper amount of briquettes. This, in turn, may result in heat which is too high or too low and, in most cases, uneven heat over the cooking area. Samples of some portable cooking grills which fall in this category include those disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,508,094 and 4,938,202, both to Hait, 4,526,158 to Lee, 3,765,397 to Henderson and 4,413,609 to Tisdale. A collapsible barbeque cooking store of this type is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 4,210,118 to David et al.
When too many briquettes are poured on the grate, either some briquettes have to be removed or the resulting pile may be too high and uneven heating results. The tendency, therefore, is to spread the briquettes over the entire area of the grate. This frequently provides heat in areas which are not needed and the briquettes are thereby inefficiently used and wasted. In U.S. Pat. No. 3,101,080 to Lorbacher an outdoor grill is disclosed which includes a free-standing partition which can be used to compact the fuel toward one end of the box, as in later stages of burning, or where a small capacity cooking job is contemplated. The partition makes it possible to contain the fuel within areas of the grill which may be varied along the length of the grill. However, movement of the partition during later stages of burning may be difficult because the partition becomes heated. Additionally, movement of burning briquettes frequently releases ash or dust which deposits on the food being cooked. Furthermore, the degree of containment will, as with the previously described embodiments, be a function of the quantity of briquettes initially deposited.
In U.S. Pat. No. 3,194,429 to Bouet a cooking device is disclosed which includes a rigid carrier frame with a handle and a cooking container which is flame resistant and disposable. The device is intended to be placed over a flame or briquettes exteriorly.
In U.S. Pat. No. 4,254,863 to Katcs et al. a barbecue pack is disclosed which is intended to be used once or twice and then disposed. The barbecue pack includes a fuel pack which may be ignited by igniting paper packets which form part of the fuel pack and which contain charcoaled lumps. The grill, however, is primarily intended to be disposed to avoid cleaning. Also, the fuel pack is generally the size of the barbecue pack, cardboard box and wire frame into which the fuel pack is received. There is no possibility to selectively provide a large cooking surface, when that is needed, or to provide a small cooking surface when that is more appropriate.
In U.S. Pat. No. 3,682,154 to Mollere, a portable disposable charcoal grill is disclosed in which charcoal briquettes are placed over a fire pan and covered by a grill. A fuel or briquette element is disclosed which consists of either one piece or an integral grid of briquette segments which require no starting fluid. The patent identifies a number of known or available "self-starting" fuel elements although, it appears that the size of the fuel element or fuel pack always corresponds to the total available cooking area or surface presented by the grill.